Tag Archives: yuletide

Finding My Year Through the Scribbling

by Liana Posted on December 31, 2013

So 2013, goodnight, goodbye
You were lovely and bright
You were terrible, my!

I loved you, I hated you
I scribbled the mess of you
Oh, 2013! Goodnight, goodbye!

End of the year post and all that demands a lot more out of me than I'm willing to give. The analytical brain was left in bed this morning and is still sleeping peacefully against my pillow. The rest of me, creative but lazily, has been puttering about today, wishing to join the analytical brain in pleasant dreams and instead working my tail off and getting little in the way of writing done. Which is a nice way of saying, expect a ramble. I'm rambly when I'm sleepy.

A Long Look Back

This was a busy year, full of good things and bad. On a personal level, I got a job, went permanent, had a falling out with someone once precious to me, lost my great-uncle, and have had ups and downs in my relationship with my sister. Nevertheless, I also had the sweetest Christmas season I can remember, starting with a Thanksgiving I actually enjoyed before all the cleanup was done.

This was the year I did the 365 Challenge and wrote original fiction as prolifically as when I dove back into fandom and whipped out 300K words of posted fanfic alone. I met a new storyworld and had so many delightful prompts and questions, I never could keep up with them all, but it produced "Dowse and Bleed" and I expect several forthcoming novelettes, novels, and collections. Additionally, I met a storyworld everybody who's read it has loved and know that it will do well if I can get it fleshed out in book format.

This was the year I did Nano—again—and failed. Again. Ah, well. :deep sigh:

This was the year I started a collaborative novel that stands more than a chance of succeeding and reaching those wonderful words, THE END. Also, I now own Scrivener. Quadruple awesome.

This was the year I moved out from sharing a room with my sister to having my own (godsend), my family blessed me with my own Samsung tablet (horrible distraction!), and the year I pulled together some actual songs to give as gifts using Finale (super fun).

This was the year I finally worked up the nerve to participate in Yuletide. If I hadn't veteraned in I Need My Fics, it never would have happened. It was wonderful, really wonderful. I loved my fics.

On the bookish front, I got my own copy of Jane Eyre now (yay!), The Left Hand of Darkness (I've been wanting to read this for forever), and Allegiant (see previous post for more on that). At some point, I might mull out how I feel about Le Guin's book, but in case I don't, let me just say it was amazing how the narrative had so many angles. The story disguises itself as Genly's story and in a very small, small way it is, but it's really Estraven's story, and the depth it takes us into the culture is amazing. I'm so glad I finally got to read this classic. Thanks, Yuletide bookswap!

Looking Forward

And next year? Next year, I'd like to write and publish, finish the Lena/Wesley book, finish fleshing out the heavier Kingdoms and Thorn and Vardin works that keep lying around, finish lithiumlaughter's fanfics "Everything is Blood" and "Body Heat," finish this collaboration with thecatisacritic, and maybe write some Divergent fanfic. I have that I must wait so long for the movie. :le sigh:

So thanks, last year, for being as big and complex and wonderful and challenging as you were and here's hoping the next year is big and wonderful for all of you. Happy New Year!

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Yuletide Has Arrived

by Liana Posted on December 26, 2013

So I made out like a bandit with two gorgeous gift fics, one for the Divergent trilogy and one for Roswell.

Tess, through the years.

Bookmarker's Notes

I have a thing for "hurts so good." This story hurts as it walks through Tess's life and the mental abuse Nasedo gave her, but it's so, so good. And the last line just slams you in the gut. Beautiful.

When the walls come tumbling down, it's not just about people being set free. It's about how others are able to come in, too.

Bookmarker's Notes

This is beautifully layered and nuanced and developed, a character study of Tobias and the city of Chicago after everything that happened. It hurt but in a good way. It was slow, but in a rich way. I forgave canon for this story.

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New Arrivals

by Liana Posted on December 4, 2013
This entry is part 4 of 8 in the series December Ramblings

Again, nothing prompted, so I picked my own topic to ramble on. :grins:

  • A Samsung Galaxy 3 Tablet in white - You want to see gleeful, shocked scribbler? This was it. I'm thrilled to my toe-tips. Now, I just need to buy a keyboard that can keep up with me, though I'm getting the hang of Polaris office.
  • The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin - I have wanted to get my hands on this book for a long time, particularly because I love M.C.A. Hogarth's The Worth of a Shell, and the two get compared a lot relatively. So I have it now due to the Yuletide bookswap and I'm thrilled to my fingertips.
  • An actual pinch-hit I managed to snag for Yuletide the other day. I don't know what I was thinking, seeing as I still have to do my regular assignment, but I can't seem to keep the grin off my face.
  • The Splintered Gates storyworld - This was a total accident, I promise. It arrived after watching too much The Book of Daniel (love that movie) and everything I could get my hands on about the upcoming Divergent movie, then playing too much mentally with the space-version of Vardin. So I could dump the Vardin and keep the clans that arrived and their physiology and their societal structure and the things already interesting me about it and the new ways to combine characters, some old, mostly new, and yeah. This is scary. I have other work to finish first, you know?

What's new with you?

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Reading and Writing, October 19

by Liana Posted on October 19, 2013
This entry is part 18 of 103 in the series Daily Scribble Reports

So yesterday's post got left at work by accident. Will post it Monday and update the weekend posts to reflect accurate numbers. In the meantime, not doing good not reading before writing.

Yuletide assignments went out and all the pinch hits went during Sabbath. Nice. :shrugs: Oh, well.

And it's back to the crossover. And you know what? That's good enough for tonight. It's late. I'm tired and cranky, and boy, do I have a jam-packed day tomorrow. I've got a board meeting and shopping and board research and yuletide and Denny/Laurie reading and rugs to wash and a kitchen to take care of. Ah well.

Count

  • Fiction: 513 words - Month to Date: 22,799 words
  • Blog: 122 words - Month to Date: 7,895 words

365 Challenge

  • 228/365 – Kingdoms and Thorn/Fracture & Recall Crossover: The Right Question – 513 words
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Reading, Writing, and Upcoming Schedule – October 17

by Liana Posted on October 17, 2013
This entry is part 16 of 103 in the series Daily Scribble Reports

FRIENDLY REMINDER: If your comment vanishes into the spam moderation ether, please email me at info at lianamir dot com so I can fish it back out.

Reading & Proofreading

I had a proofreading job come in, which will cut hard into scribbling time, but add to weather the bank advance cut-off transition, so it's a worthy switch.

I'm also going to put off reading any fiction by anyone else until after I've scribbled each day. This is an experiment. It will take nerves of steel (which I'm not entirely sure I have). More on that tomorrow.

Writing & Fanfic

So I didn't get anywhere with Laurie today. Couldn't find her mental space and realized I needed to dive into canon to do that. Canon's not at work and my lunch break didn't go to writing per usual, so yeah. Moving it down on the to-do list. I consider this a Yuletide piece.

Speaking of which, Yuletide itself is looking amazing. I signed up as a pinch-hitter and browsed through a bunch of letters. I may do the book exchange and I'm definitely going to be writing treats. In the middle of this, I promise to lithiumlaughter that I will indeed get around to hammering my head hard enough on "Everything is Blood" to finish it.

I did start off this morning with a ficlet that could go as a continuation of an interesting crossover fanfic AU (thanks, thecatisacritic) or fit within the regular Kingdoms and Thorn universe. So there's that. I do think it needs more, a continuation and exploration. Don't I have enough ficlets needing that though!

I decided to start posting more on the blog again, which is silly since I'm trying to scribble more fiction, but alas! I tend to be happiest when creatively overextended. Since I've already started doing it, I might as well just admit it.

For NanoWrimo, I still haven't the foggiest idea which book I'll write, though I'm leaning toward something with momentum, which would mean Kingdoms and Thorn or Seven Days. I love Vardin, but I'm not sure I could build up the steam in time for November. And everyone loves Seven Days. Thanks again, lithiumlaughter, for you wonderful comments. I need to get answers to your questions back, come to think of it.

Back on the evening scribbling grind, and this Kingdoms and Thorn piece is coming together again. Not sure what did the trick, but I'm liking the interactions between Justus, Cole, and Larique. I'm also realizing this thing's going to turn into a "Dowse and Bleed" size fic before it's done. Ah, well. At least I'm getting somewhere, 367 words of somewhere wraps the scene. I've a feeling it won't be done today, thecatisacritic, but you prompted it and it's coming. Now I've just got to remember to work in Justus going undercover and noticing a threat no one else does.

I'd be able to write more too, but I have a question it's going to take some percolating to answer. What in the world does that report say? Sometimes readers think we're hiding information for suspense when really, we don't actually know the information yet. Ah, well. Off to percolate. Good night!

Count

  • Fiction: 841 words - Month to Date: 21,871 words
  • Blog: 630 words - Month to Date: 7,580 words

365 Challenge

We're at day 290/365 and written piece 226/365.

Most of these pieces haven't been linked on the challenge page because they're commentfic and I'm editing the mess out of them for publishing. I really do need to get a Kingdoms and Thorn collection pulled together. But first, I want to see in_the_blue's suggestions for expanding "Dowse and Bleed." Seriously. It would be my first novella (not counting MG novel, similar word count) ever.

  • 226/365 – Kingdoms and Thorn Ficlet: Price of Reconciliation – 474 words
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Reading and Writing, October 9–10

by Liana Posted on October 10, 2013
This entry is part 9 of 103 in the series Daily Scribble Reports

So yesterday was October 9, 2013 and I wrote 513 words of last-second fiction and 84 words of blog post. So let it be noted.

I tend to use leading conjunctions, did you know that? But, and, so...

Onto today...

So. I signed up for Yuletide, wrote my letter, linked it on the Yuletide Livejournal, and otherwise freaked out but ended up feeling serenely as though I achieved something. Ahem. Yeah.

I also did my daily reading of writing/industry blogs I find useful, including Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Rusch, The Passive Voice, Juliette Wade, and others. Then, I tackled the ficlets in my LJ inbox from thecatisacritic. I still need to catch up reading on Laurie's story from in_the_blue and the rest of the Fire and Water books, but alas! That requires some ability to focus. Now, that I'm headache-free again and my leg isn't screaming this might be soon possible.

And then there's writing. I tried to use the lullaby lyrics I had in the prompt bin to write about Watcher and Shift, but I hated it. I tried a few other snippets, but the words aren't coming. I need a different angle.

Hm...

I got back my last set of beta notes on "Dowse and Bleed." Hurrah! Some edits, but they are good ones and all the typos she caught! Ack. Sometimes I wonder how in the world I can have that many words go missing... But anyway.

No scribbling today. Sorry, thecatisacritic. I'm just not really feeling up to that.

Count

  • Total Fiction: 0 words - Month to Date: 13,881 words
  • Total Blog: 1123 words - Month to Date: 5,204 words

365 Challenge

From yesterday...

  • 209/365 – Kindgoms and Thorn Ficlet: Family – 377 words
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Dear Yuletide 2013

by Liana Posted on October 10, 2013

So let's talk Yuletide. I believe this is where I'm supposed to share with you my loves, hates, and dealbreakers of fiction, plus incidental helpful asides on my requested fandoms. As a side note to that, if you write me in these fandoms, I will love you for it anyway.

That said…

My favorite stories to read are rich in worldbuilding or characterization, though I adore funny, fluffy little pieces as well. It's all about the characters for me. Okay, and the world. I love intellectual fic and fanfic, like figuring out how a superpower would logically work, exploring the implications of a speculative element, fixing unfixable canon details, taking something off-the-wall and turning into powerfully plausible within canon constraints, etc.

I admit to being easily squickable. I don't care for humor based on embarrasing situations or body-related humor at all. I'm extremely vanilla het in my romance taste (sorry, the easily squickable thing) and infinitely prefer deep friendship characterization to surface romance any day (there's too little good friendship gen fics anyway). Though deeply characterized romance is fine. Better than fine.

And dealbreakers. I try never to read:

  • Excessive swear words (or any if I can get away with it)
  • Gratuitous violence
  • Gore—at all
  • Horror
  • Zombies
  • Ghosts, spooks, spiritualism, paganism, etc.

And to the fandoms:

Awake (TV)

So this show ran too short! One little season that left me with a zillion questions and so many possibilities. I would adore Emma with Hannah/Michael fic and finding out how things go after keeping the baby. You can AU it and get him out of prison or even just do Emma + Hannah. I'd love to see that. One scene I've been hankering after for forever is when Captain Tricia Harper stole all the brownies when she met Michael, but let him have one when he caught her. But seriously, anything you write me in this 'verse will be HUGELY appreciated.

The episodes are all available from Amazon, Netflix, or iTunes. My favorite episode is the first, but that's followed pretty closely by "Say Hello to My Little Friend."

Divergent Trilogy

I cannot wait for Allegiant to come out, but since it's not out yet, we have fanfic to make up the difference. Right now, I'm particularly fascinated by the Amar + Four relationship, as developed in the two shorts, "Free Four" and "The Transfer," and also thoroughly in love with Natalie Prior. More about Tris' mom would make me extraordinarily happy: her Dauntless background or her falling in love with Andrew or her finding out about the video at the end of Insurgent. Then there's the Jeanine Matthews and Andrew Prior dynamic. They used to best friends. Seriously? I would adore seeing them younger or even their personal interactions as Jeanine starts painting Abnegation as terrible. I mean, this is her best friend's kid she's torturing. And of course, knowing Andrew's mom recorded the video, that was a bombshell I'd also love to see more about. I love and prefer the canonical relationships: friendships, siblings, family.

Onyx Court – Marie Brennan

So the only book of this series I own and have read is With Fate Conspire, though I did read the free short story available on Beneath Ceaseless Skies. Particularly, I love the character of Dead Rick, so I'd love anything with him in it, I'm very interested in that intriguing period where Valentin Aspell was dreaming for a century, and then Benjamin Hodge's childhood and selection as prince OR his picking up life again after the book would be extremely fascinating. Again, I'm pretty good with anything at this point, seeing as I don't think there's any fic in this universe at all.

The People — Zenna Henderson

Ingathering is one of my five favorite books of all time. Within that, my favorite story is far, far and away "Captivity." I missed nominating this one, so understand if you don't want to go here, but I would love to find out what happened to Francher. Did he go back for Twyla? Who was he with his mom? But especially Twyla. Barring that, I'd love to know more about Dita and her ancestral stone wall and finding out what she could do or her parents' and family's reaction and so forth.

Roswell

I'm one of those who loved this series through "Viva Las Vegas." I've liked RoswellianMisha's work  that accepts the end of the series as canon, but otherwise try to pretend it doesn't exist. Big on canonical pairings, but I'm particularly interested in Tess/Kyle or Tess + Kyle as sibling relationship. I'd love to see a fix-it where she doesn't kill Alex (which I always thought was an accident, then coverup), or really anything that gives some serious nonbashing Tess character development. She's an underdog: she was raised desperately wanting the Pod Squad as the only family she would ever have, and then they didn't want her and her alien ideas, so she tried to either offer them their alien legacy and simultaneously started learning to embrace her humanity. I want more of that without the atrocity of that murder in there. Please no dupes.

Whoever you are, thank you!

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